DLI Grad Uses Skills in Iraq


By Natela Cutter

regory's life in Southern California was typical, consisting of surfing, skating, mountain climbing, biking, and of course, that dreaded must- school. The latter was understandably not much on his mind. With a constant 80 degrees year-around, Long Beach was a place where people thought about… other things.

What would become of this 17 year-old typical Southern California outdoorsy kid could have been anyone's guess, but no one would have thought he would end up trailing behind President Bill Clinton, assigned to the Presidential Security Detail on overseas trips.

When Gunnery Sergeant Gregory Jones "Stitch" joined the United State's Marine Corps, right after High School in 1990 following diligently in his big brother's foot steps, he didn't know that even his wildest dreams would come true.

From starting out as a supply clerk he was soon to be selected for the Marine Security Guard Program, which subsequently led him to US Embassies around the globe for six years, to Switzerland, Austria, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Nicaragua, Honduras and many other countries. After a year of an exciting life traveling around the world with the president, Stitch decided that he wanted to go into a field that would better suit his capabilities and interests. He chose to move into the intelligence field in 1996 and become an Interrogator-Translator.

This choice led him to the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center (DLIFLC) where he studied Arabic for 18 months, five days a week, six hours per day, with three hours of homework every night. After graduation in 1997 he was deployed to countries where he could practice his newly acquired language abilities such as Jordan, Bahrain and Afghanistan. He also spent time in Bosnia-Herzegovina and aided in the implementation of the US-brokered Dayton Peace Accord which calls for the political, financial and social reintegration of the ethnically diverse peoples of Bosnia. It was there that he acquired his nickname "Stitch," after a character playing the role of a Marine corporal in a famous old fashioned Marine war movie. "It was a cold day in Bosnia, when someone said that we needed call-names for the radio… so that is how (Stitch) it stuck," he said.

Thanks to his language abilities, when Stitch deployed to Iraq last year, he soon found himself in a situation where his skills were more than necessary to complete his tasking. A large part of Stitch's job became working with the public on a daily basis and collecting intelligence through locals. He was also involved in training Iraqi policemen at the police academy in Anbar, a province where Fallujah and Ramadi are located.

"I was able to go out with them on patrol and got a better feel for what was going on in the streets," said Stitch, adding that a lot of his job entailed "language heavy duties," making threat assessments on the basis of information collected, identifying threats before events took place, interrogation of those detained, etc.

When asked what he gained on a personal level from being stationed in Iraq for over a year, Stitch said that he was happy to learn that most Iraqis really appreciate US military presence in Iraq, in contrast to what domestic mainstream media reports say. "I gained a thorough understanding of why we are there… A lot of people do not understand the level of appreciation of the Iraqis (toward us). I have seen it all - from a little girl riding a bicycle freely for the first time - smiling and going around and around - to the perspective of Iraqis having opportunities they wouldn't have had because of the (Saddam Hussein's) Baath party.

Much of Stitch's assessment about the Iraqi people was that they were eager to embrace freedom, have jobs, go to school and continue living their lives normally, but he said that there was still an inexplicable fear of former President Saddam Hussein's Baath party. "Some of them are convinced that his son's are not dead, but that they are still out there. One interpreter would never use Saddam's name - never. She would always say the 'ex president' because you were not allowed to mention his name, at least according to her," said Stitch.

The DLI grad explained that real chaos and disorder in the country mainly stemmed from the nearly two-year period of lawlessness and Hussein's release of a large number of convicted prisoners just before the war started.

"It is basically a mafioso-type of environment over there. Some things we are trying to implement are very hard for the Iraqis to understand. For example, I had a situation where I talked to a lieutenant about the problems I was having with a major. When he came back he said 'don't worry about it, it's not a problem, I fired him.' Stitch said he was in shock, because the lieutenant explained that although the major was higher ranking, he came from a more powerful tribe, therefore, he simply got rid of him.

"It was a wake-up call for me because it is hard for them to get past the family structure, tribal structure, the sheiks, the heads of the tribes, etc.," he said, explaining that a good portion of his tasks were making sure that corruption did not take place within the working place at the Iraqi police department. "I had to make sure that Iraqis paid other Iraqis their salaries."

Stitch said that one of the biggest problems encountered in Iraq, vis-a-vis working on the ground on a daily basis, was the rapid production of anti-Coalition local propaganda which struck at the hearts of the population by altering images and misrepresenting the truth.

"They produce a new CD almost every week," said Stitch, explaining that it was cheap to produce, splice and edit in order to misrepresent events and evoke the emotions of the largely uneducated population. He said that he witnessed people literally sobbing while watching the videos, accompanied by powerful music and full of images of misery and suffering. "The insurgents exploit these emotions. The average Iraqi really believes this. It obviously upset people and pitted them against us." he said.

But despite these difficulties, Stitch says that he believes the Iraqi people are ready to change their lives, to embrace democracy and let the past slip into distant memory in order to have a better future for themselves and their children.